Neville Trueman the Pioneer Preacher | Page 2

grow, till all the air Rings with the brazen trumpet blare.
Towards the close of a sultry day in July, in the year 1812, might have
been seen a young man riding along the beautiful west bank of the
Niagara River, about three miles above its mouth. His appearance
would anywhere have attracted attention. He was small in person and
singularly neat in his attire. By exposure to summer's sun and winter's
cold, his complexion was richly bronzed, but, as he lifted his
broad-leafed felt hat to cool his brow, it could be seen that his forehead
was smooth and white and of a noble fulness, indicating superior
intellectual abilities. His hair was dark,
--his eye beneath Flashed like falchion from its sheath.
His bright, quick glances, alternating with a full and steady gaze,
betokened a mind keenly sympathetic with emotions both of sorrow
and of joy. His dress and accoutrements were those of a travelling
Methodist preacher of the period. He wore a suit of "parson's grey," the
coat having a straight collar and being somewhat rounded away in front.
His buckskin leggings, which descended to his stirrups, were splashed
with mud, for the day had been rainy. He was well mounted on a
light-built, active-looking chestnut horse. The indispensable

saddle-bags, containing his Greek Testament, Bible, and Wesley's
Hymns, and a few personal necessaries, were secured across the saddle.
A small, round, leathern valise, with a few changes of linen, and his
coarse frieze great-coat were strapped on behind. Such was a typical
example of the "clerical cavalry" who, in the early years of this century,
ranged through the wilderness of Canada, fording or swimming rivers,
toiling through forests and swamps, and carrying the gospel of Christ to
the remotest settlers in the backwoods.
Our young friend, the Rev. Neville Trueman, afterwards a prominent
figure in the history of early Methodism, halted his horse on a bluff
jutting out into the Niagara River, both to enjoy the refreshing breeze
that swept over the water and to admire the beautiful prospect. At his
feet swept the broad and noble river, reflecting on its surface the snowy
masses of "thunderhead" clouds, around which the lightning still played,
and which, transfigured and glorified in the light of the setting sun,
seemed to the poetic imagination of the young man like the City of God
descending out of heaven, with its streets of gold and foundations of
precious stones, while the rainbow that spanned the heavens seemed
like the rainbow of the Apocalypse round about the throne of God.
Under the inspiration of the beauty of the scene, the young preacher
began to sing in a clear, sweet, tenor voice that song of the ages, which
he had learned at his mother's knee among the green hills of Vermont--
Jerusalem the golden, With milk and honey blest, Beneath thy
contemplation, Sink heart and voice opprest,
I know not, oh! I know not What joys await me there; What radiancy of
glory, What bliss beyond compare.
They stand, those walls of Zion, All jubilant with song, And bright with
many an angel, And all the martyr throng.
With jasper glow thy bulwarks, Thy streets with emeralds blaze, The
sardius and the topaz Unite in thee their rays.
Thine ageless walls are bonded With amethyst unpriced;
The saints build up its fabric, The corner-stone is Christ.
[Footnote: We cannot resist the temptation to give a few lines of the
original hymn of Bernard of Clugny, a Breton monk of English
parentage of the 12th century--"the sweetest of all the hymns of
heavenly homesickness of the soul," and for generations one of the
most familiar, through translations, in many languages. The rhyme and

rhythm are so difficult, that the author was able to master it, he
believed, only by special inspiration of God.
Urbs Syon aurea, patria lactea, cive decora, Omne cor obruis, omnibus
obstruis et cor et ora, Nescio, nescio, quae jubilatio, lux tibi qualis,
Quam socialia gaudia, gloria quam specialis.]
For a moment longer he gazed upon the broad, flowing river which
divided two neighbouring peoples, one in language, in blood, in heroic
early traditions, and the common heirs of the grandest literature the
world has ever seen, yet severed by a deep, wide, angry-flowing stream
of strife, which, dammed up for a time, was about to burst forth in a
desolating flood that should overwhelm and destroy some of the fairest
fruits of civilization in both countries. As he gazed northward, he
beheld, on the eastern bank of the river, the snowy walls and
grass-grown ramparts of Fort Niagara, above which floated proudly the
stars and stripes.
As he gazed on the ancient fort, the memories of its strange eventful
history came thronging on his mind from the time that La Salle thawed
the frozen